Justine Kilkerr's Blog

Hmm. This seems to be turning into a photo blog. So be it, for now.

I found a shy horse in the snow a few weeks ago. Here he is:

I'll be working on a new story over the weekend.

That's all the news that's fit to print for now, folks.

Sunday, Shoreham, an abandoned fort, sleepy winter plants clinging to the shingle, a sunset. We wandered about a bit, took photographs, warmed up in the pub afterwards.

Once upon a time there was a girl, let's call her Justine, who had a blog. She was happy with her blog, though she neglected it from time to time.

One day her blog got hacked and the hosting company had to delete every file and every comment and every email.

So they did.

The end.

This is the beginning of a new story.

Also, the beginning of regular backups.

Hello.

A and A found Advice for Strays at the famous, and famously-beautiful, London bookshop Daunt Books, which made me happy. Look at this place, will you:

Yes, you get a bit of A's finger in there too. You're welcome.

I've never been, but I intend to visit Daunt Books the first chance I get. As it's mainly a travel bookshop I may pick up a map or two, some new travel fantasies, an increased desire to diappear into the wilderness, OK maybe this isn't such a good idea after all…

An update is overdue, is it not? It is!

So the paperback of Advice for Strays, published by Vintage, came out on April 7th. Folks have been buying it. There have been reviews. Oh yes. These are they:

Advice for Strays was "Book of the Week" in Stylist Magazine .

The Daily Mail reviewed it.

It was paperback of the Week in the Glasgow Herald a couple of weeks ago.

Pretty great stuff.

As for me, I have just submittted a short story to the BBC Short Story Award 2011, so we'll see how that goes.

That's it for now.

Here we go again.

I got a box full of the new paperback version of my novel Advice for Strays from my publisher this morning, all caged in rubber bands. The new cover is sweet and features the Brighton sea railings. I'm not sure why, as the book has nothing to do with Brighton, but there it is. Nice.

I've been very lax in updating this darn blog over the past few months so here are the latest stuff and things. Or reviews and articles. Let's call them reviews and articles, shall we? Because that's what a normal human being with a basic grasp of language would likely do.

So in reverse chronological order what's been happening lately is as follows:

The online magazine Running in Heels gave me this recently, which is rather lovely.

I had an article in The Guardian.

Advice for Strays was featured ...

Well, that was stimulating.

After much controversy, the original shortlist for The Guardian's Not The Booker Prize stands. Which means my novel, Advice for Strays, is on it. Which is amazing. Thanks so much to everyone who voted for it to get there.

The next stage is that the folks at The Guardian are reading and reviewing each of the shortlisted titles and mine is next. The review should be online next week, I think.

I am nervous.

The first article/review about my book has appeared in this month's edition of Aesthetica magazine and I'm pretty blown away by it. I'd been interviewed about the novel but wasn't expecting anything like this. It's fantastic.

Here. Have a blurry iPhone photo of it:

The observant among you may recognise the photo as one I took of myself last summer, hiding from lions and tigers and bears oh my! in the field behind Sussex University.

For some reason their website seems to be down at the moment...

Today is the day my first novel Advice for Strays is published.

Today is a day I never thought I'd live to see.

Today I have the day off work.

Today the sun is shining.

Today is a good day.